Trial of Magic

by K. M. Shea

  Snow White scooped up a dagger and scrambled up to the throne. She ran past it, closing in on the mirror—though her steps became slow, and she started to shiver uncontrollably.

  Help them! Angelique’s magic raged in her, as her mind screamed, Do something!

  But she was so close!

  The mirror doesn’t have a spell on it, so it’s not a spell keeping Evariste in, but the mirror’s sheer power. I need to use my magic to fight it off, but what if—to get him out…

  Angelique wasn’t stupid.

  She didn’t romantically love Evariste.

  However, if she’d learned anything over the past few years, it was that missing Evariste—feeling his absence—was an ache that never went away and a wound that cut far deeper than she’d ever expected.

  As his student, she’d respected him, but she hadn’t valued their relationship.

  Evariste had, however. He’d always made it plain that he cared for her. Even when she thought he was a dream and—

  I love him. I don’t know how to define what kind of love, but I do love him. And that is all I need to get him out.

  Satisfied, Angelique released her hold on her magic, and it roared free.

  Chapter 29

  She was here.

  Evariste could feel her unique, remarkable magic. Not just where the flicker of her powers still prodded at the wall blocking his magic in his soul, but outside the mirror.

  He thought he could see her, but although the surface wasn’t hazy like it usually was, outside it was smudged—almost like a painting.

  He was fairly certain, however, that the lively smudge wearing bright blue was Angelique.

  She’d come. After all this time, she never gave up.

  Angelique stopped and gaped at the mirror every few minutes—practically oblivious to the fighting around her.

  He stared at her, a weird, starving sensation twisting in his gut as he noticed her unevenly cut hair and unusual clothes.

  Can she tell I’m here? I think she knows I’m in a mirror, but I don’t know that she can sense it’s this one.

  Evariste paced back and forth, as close to the mirror’s surface as possible.

  She’s not using magic—why is she not using magic? Isn’t Clovicus or Sybilla with her? Why is she alone? What’s been happening that she appears to be alone? The mirror is too dangerous to face alone—I, of all people should know!

  Evariste’s cloak tangled around his legs as he impatiently paced—hope and fear blooming in his chest.

  He might be able to get out—he could almost taste freedom!

  But if the mirror can overpower Angelique…if it captures her and engulfs her the way it has engulfed me…

  Evariste pushed against the mirror’s surface and tried one last mad scramble for his magic.

  No! I can’t let her be taken!

  Neither yielded, but he didn’t give up. He wasn’t going to stop fighting until he was out.

  Angelique’s magic surged through her—cold and knifelike—as she finally let herself sprint across the throne room.

  She pounded past Snow White and barely noticed when frost clung to the tips of her messy hair and her magic cut through the swampy fog that had begun to gather. She skidded to a stop in front of the mirror and slammed her fists on its surface. “Evariste!”

  He appeared in the mirror, wearing the blue and black cloak he’d been in the day the Chosen kidnapped him—the cloak she’d seen in her dream.

  Evariste pressed his palms into the other side of the glass. “Angelique!”

  Angelique slapped her hands over his. Despite the freezing temperatures the mirror was radiating, she could have sworn she felt the heat of his hands through the glass.

  The wind howled as the mirror gathered more magic to it.

  Angelique grimly planted her legs as it tried to push her away.

  “Angel—you have to leave,” Evariste shouted.

  “Not when I’ve just found you!” Angelique shook her head, trying to dislodge some of the frost that covered her eyelashes so she could see better.

  “It’s too dangerous!” Evariste said. “Please—I just want you safe!”

  “I’ve looked for you for six years, Master Evariste,” Angel growled. “I’m not giving you up now.”

  Choices…the mirror whispered. The murky voice was gone, but a cold, ancient voice had taken its place.

  Rage…Power…

  Angel ignored it as she slammed her fists on the mirror. “I’m getting you out!”

  “But you can’t! Not with your current abilities—”

  Angelique shut her eyes and gathered her core magic to her. She’d loosened it before approaching the mirror, now she harnessed it—but not to twist it into a different kind of magic or spell. No, she needed her magic to be as deadly as possible.

  When she flicked her eyes open, her magic engulfed the room. It brushed against every sharp object in the room (which glittered in the back of Angelique’s mind) and was so potent, it broke the skylights and poured out of the open door. It covered the oblivious soldiers fighting outside the throne room, gushed down hallways, and spilled out of the castle, rapidly spreading across all of the Glitzern Palace grounds.

  Angelique’s mind was cluttered with the knowledge of broken pieces of glass, cracks in windows, stored arrows, jagged rocks, the guard armories and more. It filled her with an intoxicating sensation of power.

  But, as she suspected, even with all of that power, Angelique’s hand couldn’t push through the mirror’s surface.

  Perhaps all those curses weren’t so stupid after all. Maybe—hopefully—love is the strongest force in life after all.

  “Give him back.” Angelique’s magic put extra force behind her words as she felt her powers gush from the well of her magic.

  Her core magic surged around the mirror, trying to crush it. It beat back the mirror’s black magic, but when it touched the mirror’s frame, it brushed against the ancient, foreign magic that had nearly killed Angelique when she used the tracking spell and stole her breath from her so her lungs felt like they’d crumpled in her chest.

  That’s not the mirror’s magic, she dimly realized. That’s the mirror itself.

  “Never,” the mirror whispered. “Evariste is mine.”

  “That wasn’t a request!” Angelique grabbed the mirror on either side.

  How do I do this? It’s very grand to say I need to use love—but how?

  The mirror rattled in her grasp, but Angelique doggedly hung on, even when the mirror’s sheer presence overwhelmed her, its bottomless power so effortlessly wrapped around her, she couldn’t move. The pain was immense. It wracked her body, making it feel as if it was crushing her. If she didn’t soon let go, it would kill her!

  “Angel!”

  That’s right—I need to think of Evariste. I need to think of what he means to me.

  Angelique’s mouth opened in a scream that wouldn’t come, and it was only the power of her magic that kept her standing as she clung to the mirror despite the pain.

  Shaking, she forced herself to look at Evariste.

  He hammered on the other side of the mirror, his blue and green eyes gleaming with desperation as he shouted things she couldn’t hear. A thatch of his blonde hair hung over his forehead, and even though he’d been locked in an immeasurably evil thing, his concern was for her.

  That’s what I love about him. His generous spirit and kindness so deep it’s immeasurably strong. I missed it. And his laugh—the way he’d tease Roland, even his ridiculous insistence that we buy matching clothes and that Stil was our child.

  She gritted her teeth as pain clogged her throat, and pushed past it.

  Angelique had been in agony for six years, missing Evariste.

  What the mirror was inflicting upon her? It was middling in comparison.

  Angelique held Evariste’s gaze. His handsome face was lined with worry, and he shook his head.

  Angelique tried to smile, and then she peeled
her right hand off the mirror’s frame and once again pushed it against the mirror’s surface.

  It resisted for a moment, and Angelique thought of the late, warm nights they spent drinking tea as they laughed about a nearly botched assignment, of the wintery afternoons they’d spent in the workshop tinkering with magic in companionable silence, of all the shared joys and sorrows and amusement—each precious moment that, in her silly suspicion, she hadn’t valued enough at the time.

  But now she knew better. Now, Angelique knew she loved Evariste.

  The mirror changed from a hardened surface to a jelly-like texture, and Angelique pressed her fingers through it.

  The mirror shook, and the numb sensation of its ancient presence grew that much stronger as she pushed her hand inside. The surface rippled, pooling at her wrist until she pushed her arm in all the way up to her forearm.

  Evariste watched—afraid to breathe—as Angelique’s hand passed through the mirror.

  She’s doing it.

  Angelique’s magic burned around her with the light of a shooting star. The silver of her eyes glowed, and her magic spiraled under her feet and filled up the room.

  She’s always been powerful, but when did she become this skilled? How long have I been captured?

  Evariste laughed as Angelique pushed her entire forearm into the mirror.

  No wonder the Chosen fear her! I cannot wait to see her beat them!

  “Take my hand!” she shouted.

  Evariste stared into her eyes—which raged silver with her power—and felt the enormous pressure of her magic even through the mirror’s surface.

  A part of him still couldn’t believe that she was here—alone!

  I’ve missed her for so long, and she’s helped me more than she likely knows with her magic, and she’s finally here.

  “I love you!” the words were out of his mouth before he could rethink them.

  Angelique squinted a little and tipped her head at that specific angle she used whenever she wasn’t sure what he had said.

  She didn’t hear me.

  He wasn’t sure if his relief or disappointment was stronger.

  Before she could ask what he said, he grabbed Angelique’s hand, his eyes briefly fluttering shut when—for the first time in what felt like a decade—he touched another human being.

  “Take my hand!” Angelique shouted, desperately hoping Evariste would hear her over the wind gusts.

  Evariste said something—she couldn’t quite tell what—but his hand folded shut around hers, and Angelique almost cried. She wasn’t sure if it was the pain or the familiar feel of his hand, this was the assurance she needed to know it was really Evariste.

  Angelique rolled her shoulders back, then flicked her eyes up to the giant red gem on the top of the mirror.

  Sybilla thinks I need to disrupt it to get him out? Fine. I can do that.

  “Go,” Angelique said.

  Her magic flowed through her, channeling down her arm and straight into the mirror’s interior, piercing it through with silver. Always enthusiastic in its deadliness, it splashed past Evariste, pouring into the mirror with the crispness of a sword thrust.

  The mirror’s overbearing presence lifted. It didn’t retreat entirely, but under the invasion of her powers—bolstered by her hold on nearly every weapon inside the palace—the mirror shifted its focus to her magic.

  “Enough!” the mirror hissed.

  It tried to block her powers, but her magic sliced straight through its resistance.

  I don’t have enough power to totally overwhelm it, but I have more than enough to push it back long enough to get Evariste out!

  Angelique set her shoulders, and then pulled on Evariste’s hand, holding her breath as her arm passed back through the jelly-like surface. Her wrist passed through, then her palm, and then Evariste’s fingers!

  She could hardly believe it as she pulled his arm out. Her heart beat faster and faster as Evariste tested it, pushing a booted foot against the surface, passing through it without resistance.

  “No!” the mirror snarled.

  It launched its magic at Evariste’s back while he was mostly still inside the mirror.

  But Angelique’s magic hadn’t stopped flowing. And while she’d lose in a long fight, her magic wasn’t even nearing the bottom of her resources.

  Rather, she felt more alive than she had in ages.

  It only took a tiny nudge to her magic, and it pierced the mirror’s attack, dismantling it as it relentlessly pounded the artifact. Rivers of her magic pooled around her feet, flowing out from her in a star-like shape.

  But no matter how much her magic saturated the room, she couldn’t quite seem to match the mirror’s power. She needed to finish this fast, or she’d lose him. Again.

  Every muscle in her body trembled as she dragged Evariste so he was halfway out. Even with her magic’s undisturbed attack, the mirror’s magic clung to him, actively trying to drag him back.

  No, you don’t. I’ve come too far, practiced too hard, and have searched too long to let a mirror keep him from me—artifact or not!

  Angelique sucked in air between her clenched teeth and cut off contact with her magic. The unnumbered weapons that littered her mind disappeared.

  Her magic was out only for a moment, but it was all the chance the mirror needed. Unfettered, it unleashed more of its magic—rapidly dropping the temperature of the room so the sweat that beaded on Angelique’s brow froze.

  Angelique sank deep into the spring of her magic. It stretched around her like an ocean—placid and calm despite the battle around her.

  And then—as she’d practiced countless times with Puss and later Quinn—she collected as much as she could possibly hold (so much that her skin tingled) and released it in one electrified bolt.

  She yelled as she unleashed it—her consciousness once again filling with the glittering knowledge of all the weapons in the palace.

  The concentration of her magic was so thick and so sudden, the air felt sharp as her powers gushed to the outskirts of Glitzern. It burned through the coin bespelled by Stil to slightly change her features, hitting the coin with such fierceness, it burned in her tunic and must have cracked in half. The attack was relentless, and it cut through the mirror’s horrible magic.

  With one final, desperate pull, Angelique jerked Evariste out of the mirror, managing to swing him behind her so she stood between him and the awful artifact.

  She clutched Evariste’s hand so tightly, she had to have been hurting him, but she didn’t dare let go. No—she’d never let go! At least not for days.

  The mirror’s surface swirled.

  “Evariste…”

  “No,” Angelique vowed in a voice tight with passion. “Never again!”

  She snapped her left leg up and kicked with everything she had, knocking the mirror backwards.

  It didn’t crack—it was too infused with magic for that—but it made a resounding crash that was quite satisfying.

  Angelique was fairly certain Evariste exhaled a single breath of laughter, but she swung around and looked past him, her consciousness prickling with the awareness of the armored constructs, and their less-potent companions in the halls and galleys around the palace.

  The mirror’s magic was still present—it was as cold as Verglas in the throne room, and the wind whipped hard enough to make Angelique’s eyes sting. But Angelique was used to the coldness of her own magic, so she barely registered it as her powers twined around her.

  I’m not sick from my price yet—that means I have to strike now!

  Angelique pulled her hand back as she mentally sorted through all the sharp-edged things her magic had claimed, picking out the armored constructs’ swords—which would probably be the only things strong enough to harm them—and all the arrows, swords, crossbow bolts, spears, and weapons the Mullberg soldiers and guards wielded, which she could feel but not see.

  She gently tugged the weapons from the soldiers’ hands, dragging them i
nto the air with the obsidian constructs’ swords.

  Her mind buzzed with information as she held the weapons high above everyone, stretching her awareness so she could aim with the same precision she used to create her pin pictures.

  Then, at once, she released it.

  The weapons dropped, falling on their carefully chosen targets.

  The onyx swords pierced the constructs’ rocky armor, stabbing them straight through. The armored constructs swayed for a moment, until each one fell in on itself, destroyed by its own blade.

  Outside the throne room, it took Angelique a few more waves of attacks to make certain she’d gotten every last one of the mirror’s constructs.

  I can’t leave a single one—we’re going to lock this monstrosity in the deepest, darkest dungeon of the Veneno Conclave, and I’m going to escort it there myself!

  She narrowed her eyes in concentration as she cut through both the shadow-forged humanoid constructs and the giant, lumbering, troll-like constructs, as well.

  She stopped only when she felt the last fizzle of the spell that held them together disappear, leaving only the mirror’s terrible (and enraged) presence.

  Angelique held her magic tight, almost afraid to let go, afraid to let her guard down even when she couldn’t feel any other magic besides her own.

  Then Evariste stood and wrapped his arms around her.

  For a moment, she thought she might have dreamed the entire fight up—perhaps her mind had lost it in an effort to shield her from the disappointment of missing him.

  And then she felt Evariste slide his hands across her back and felt the soft fabric of his cloak press into her cheek.

  He’s here. He’s out. I found him.

  Her tears of relief and joy came fast—almost knocking her legs out from underneath her as she clung to Evariste.

  She unashamedly pressed her face into his shoulder and cried harder when he rested his chin on top of her head. “It’s you,” she sobbed. “It’s really you!”